I tried the drink again—still too sweet. FM set another basket of fries in front of me, fortunately, and I attacked them. The spices were just so good. Flavor that made my mouth wake up, as if from a long slumber.
The others continued to reminisce about Hurl—their voices tinged with the same pain I felt. They got it. They understood. I wasn’t alone, not here.
I found myself explaining what Jorgen and I had done. They listened solemnly to the details.
“I should have gone with you,” Arturo said. “You think Cobb would let me hold her pin for a moment, if I asked? Before he gives it back to the family?”
Bryn rubbed his arm as he looked down at the table.
“Remember that time,” Nedd said, “that she bet she could eat more algae patties than me at dinner?”
“She ended up on the floor,” FM said, wistful. “On the floor. just lying there, groaning. Complained about it all night, claiming the patties were fighting in her stomach.”
The others laughed, but Arturo stared at his cup. He seemed . . . hollow. He’d almost died in that battle. Hopefully the ground crew would have his ship running again by the time our leave was done.
That, of course, made me think of the work Rig was doing on M-Bot. And the fact that I owed him. A lot.
“FM,” I said. “What do you think of smart guys?”
“I’m already taken,” Arturo said with a smile.
FM rolled her eyes. “Depends. How handsome are we talking?”
“Handsome, in a reserved way.”
“Guys, I’m already taken,” Arturo said again.
“FM would only want to romance someone low-class,” Nedd said, “to defy the powers that be. A kind of star-crossed, impossible love is the only love FM would accept.”
“My entire life isn’t dominated by being a rebel, Nedd,” she said.
“Yeah?” Nedd said. “What kind of drink did you get?”
I noticed, for the first time, that her drink was orange while everyone else was having purple.
She rolled her eyes again. “You are stupid.”
“The right kind?”
“The annoying kind.”
“I’ll take it.”
Their banter continued, and I sat back, enjoying my fries until Bryn got up to use the restroom. With her gone it was just our flight, and I found myself itching to say something to them, now that we were away from the DDF headquarters, where I always felt like someone was watching.
“Can we talk about something?” I finally said, interrupting a story Nedd was telling. “I keep thinking about the questions Arturo brought up in class that one time. Isn’t it weird that we can fight an enemy for eighty years, and have only a vague idea what they look like?”
Kimmalyn nodded. “How convenient is it that the Krell never commit more than a maximum of a hundred fighters to an individual assault? The defense platforms up in the debris field explain a lot of why we’re still alive down here, but this question bothers me. Couldn’t the Krell send twice as many and overwhelm us?”
“It’s suspicious,” FM said. “Very.”
“You’d say that no matter what,” Nedd said.
“And in this case, do you disagree?” FM asked.
He didn’t reply.
“We can’t be the only ones who’ve asked these questions, right?” I said. “So . . . does the DDF really not know the answers? Or are they hiding them?”
Like they were hiding the truth about my father.
“Okay, to play devil’s advocate,” Arturo said, “perhaps they just don’t share that sort of intel with cadets and noncombatants. I know you don’t like the admiral, Spin—with good reason—but her record is excellent, and she has some very good advisors.”
“And yet we’re losing,” I said, pulling my seat closer to the table, trying to speak quietly. “You all know we are. The Krell are going to eventually get us.”
The others fell silent, and Arturo glanced around, checking to see if any other occupied tables were close enough to hear us.
“They don’t want us asking these questions,” Kimmalyn said. “Remember that time at dinner, when Arturo was talking? How the passing officer told him to shut up? Everyone but Cobb shuts down any conversation about the hard questions.”
“They need meatheads,” FM added. “Pilots who blindly do what they’re told and never express an ounce of originality, compassion, or soul.”
Arturo’s girlfriend reappeared, winding her way back to our table. I leaned in closer. “Just . . . think about it,” I said quietly. “Because I am.” I felt at my pocket, and the data chip tucked inside.
The conversation turned to lighter topics, but FM looked at me and smiled, a twinkle in her eyes. As if she was proud of my questions. She seemed to think I’d always been some brainwashed Defiant zombie, but she didn’t know me. Didn’t know how I’d lived most of my life outside their society, wandering the tunnels and scavenging.
If anything, I would want Defiants to be more brave, more heroic—more like in Gran-Gran’s stories. But I supposed that she and I could agree on one thing in this area: the current leadership of the DDF left something to be desired.
I let FM—well, Arturo—buy me a third basket of fries. Then I eventually excused myself. I had enjoyed the meal with them, but there was something else I needed to do.
It was time to find some answers.
39
Rig was gone by the time I got back to my cavern, though he appeared to have made some good progress on the booster. Doomslug was sitting on a rock near the wing, and I scratched her head as I walked to the cockpit, then climbed in.
I felt a strange sense of . . . inevitability. I carried long-kept secrets in my pocket. The answers, at long last, to what had happened with my father. Why was I suddenly so reluctant?
I closed the cockpit. “M-Bot, do you know how to get the hologram out of something like this?” I held up the metal case, showing the connectors on the bottom.
“Yes,” he said. “That’s a standard format. See the series of ports underneath the panel marked ‘A-118’？ You want the port that reads ‘SSXB.’ ”
I followed the instructions, hesitating only briefly before plugging in the case.
M-Bot hummed to himself. “Ah. Curious. Curious.”
“What?”
“I’m drawing out the suspense so you enjoy the surprise.”
“Please don’t.”
“Humans prefer—”
“Just tell me.”
“Fine, complainer. This includes a great deal of data. A three-D holomap, but also the original ship transponder data, radio signals of the battle, and even some camera footage from inside bunkers. This would be very hard to fake.”
Fake. I hadn’t considered that, but now I found myself anxious. “Are you sure?”
“I’d spot any edits. Would you like to watch it?”
“Yes.”
No.
“Then climb out.”
“Climb out?”
“My holoprojector can emit a small version of the battle for you to watch.”
I heaved myself out of the cockpit, scratching Doomslug on the head—she’d moved to the nose of the ship—and dropped with a thump to the rocky floor.